I’m a contemporary storyteller, creating and sharing intelligent, irreverent spoken-word shows with audiences across the UK, and beyond. I also research and write about contemporary storytellers, as well as training and mentoring students to develop their own storytelling practices.

Raised between the North-East and Argyll (often in the back of a Ford Cortina), I especially love telling English and Scottish fairytales, the fiery folklore of the Anglo-Scottish Borders, and salvaged stories from the two kingdoms’ historic and mythic pasts.

I’m also fascinated by the challenge of using storytelling to help promote a positive sense of belonging, and a spirit of creative citizenship, across a range of communities and contexts.

I’m currently leading a British Academy funded research project which supports storytelling artists in England to develop new, ethically-engaged performance repertoires in post-colonial contexts. You can find out more here.

At the same time, I’m developing and touring Stories from Mythic England. This fierce and funny performance project sets out to re-discover the many different tales England has told itself about its identity and destiny. And it embraces this tradition of self-storying as an opportunity to start playful, inclusive, and empowering conversations about the kind of nation(s) we want to imagine for ourselves today …